Texas man charged with running $60M Bitcoin Ponzi scheme

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged a Texas man with running a Ponzi scheme in which he raised “at least” 700,000 Bitcoin, worth $4.5 million at the time and more than $60 million today. This charge is the culmination of the SEC’s first investigation into Bitcoin fraud. Trendon T. Shavers promised “investors” a seven percent weekly interest rate, the SEC says , in order to entice their investments in the “Bitcoin Savings and Trust” bank, which was supposed to engage in Bitcoin market arbitrage — making money of the rising and falling of the value of the virtual currency. Instead, Bitcoin Savings and Trust was a sham and Shavers used Bitcoin from new investors to pay old investors, a classic Ponzi strategy. “Fraudsters are not beyond the reach of the SEC just because they use Bitcoin or another virtual currency to mislead investors and violate the federal sec...